This building establishes a forward looking character for the School of Engineering and Applied Science, while remaining sensitive to existing site conditions and context. The footprint and massing respond to adjacent buildings, with particular attention to scale and fenestration. The building is articulated as a glazed pavilion presenting luminous, transparent facades to the campus. This strategy allows daylight to be maximized on a dense, urban site, and provides visual interconnections between the life of the campus and life within the building. The facades are constructed using ventilated curtain wall technology in a composition of transparent and translucent glass. This project represents the first use of this system in the United States. Although the technology is new, proportions were determined using mathematical ratios following the golden section.
This building establishes a forward looking character for the School of Engineering and Applied Science, while remaining sensitive to existing site conditions and context. The footprint and massing respond to adjacent buildings, with particular attention to scale and fenestration. The building is articulated as a glazed pavilion presenting luminous, transparent facades to the campus. This strategy allows daylight to be maximized on a dense, urban site, and provides visual interconnections between the life of the campus and life within the building. The facades are constructed using ventilated curtain wall technology in a composition of transparent and translucent glass. This project represents the first use of this system in the United States. Although the technology is new, proportions were determined using mathematical ratios following the golden section.
The building provides 48,000 SF of new space, housing offices, research labs, meeting spaces and lounges for the Computer and Information Science Department, a 150-seat auditorium and a cyber café. The building is intended to provide long-term flexibility in the use and arrangement of space. Accordingly, the floors are loft-like with 14'-0" floor-to-floor heights and exposed structural and mechanical systems. The use of a post-tensioned concrete structure maximizes usable interior volume. The building contains six floors and is designed to accommodate a future seventh floor.
Details
Early on, the client referred to the proposed laboratory as a bridge building; it would finally complete the engineering complex, and departments would no longer be isolated at the end of cul-de-sac corridors. This simple act of connection allowed for a central courtyard, which also joins the departments by providing a common point of orientation. The first floor is a place of arrival and orientation featuring a double-height lobby with a view to the courtyard beyond. While there was enthusiastic support for the active curtainwall, there was also concern for seeking an approach sensitive to the historic campus. By knitting the curtainwall with the brick, a detail was created which allowed the client to fully embrace the design. In traditional construction large stone units reinforce vulnerable corners, interlocking themselves with a brick field. Where the new glass building joins the existing masonry, the brick becomes a quoin, weaving its way zipper-like into the glass curtainwall. This was an important detail for the university. It is the moment of negotiation between the adjoining early twentieth century structures and the twenty-first century glass curtainwall.
Curtainwall
The design incorporates a pressure-equalized ventilated curtain wall system, which combines the conventional advantages of glass (views and daylighting) with substantial energy efficiency and interior comfort. Key components of the ventilated systems include an external pressure-equalized double glazed unit, an internal single glazed unit, a continuous mechanically ventilated cavity with air flow supplied by room air (the air has an inlet at the base and outlet at the head of the glazing frame), an intermediate blind located in the cavity, and a custom unitized aluminum frame, factory glazed.
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